After Munich, we planned to meet up with some of Troy’s relatives in Innsbruck. Unfortunately these plans fell through, but we’re very glad we still made the trip to Austria. What an incredibly scenic country! We stayed in a pretty little village called Maurach. The town is located on Achensee, the largest mountain lake in the country.
Achensee with Maurach in the distance
One of the most unforgettable experiences we had on our road trip was hiking in the Alps. We took a cable car up and chose a hike to one of the peaks.
Mountain trail
Troy & trough
There were cows all over the place, right off the trail. It was interesting to see them scrambling around on the mountain terrain. Cows in the U.S. look so lazy in comparison!
The cows also have bells that make wonderful tinkling sounds. Troy forgot his recorder but I managed to get a (poor quality) video that gives you an idea.
Unfortunately, it really clouded up on our way up the mountain and we weren’t able to have much of a view by the end of the hike even though we eventually reached the peak. Also, we thought it was a 2 hour hike but it was actually 4 hours round trip. And once we got to the top, we waited for the fog to dissipate longer than we should have. This resulted in us missing the last cable car down the mountain! The only other way to get down was to walk, and so our 2-hour hike ended up being about a 7 hour hike. Oof. I was sore for the next several days!
Here are some more pics from Bavaria and Tyrol.
I had a similar experience in Switzerland–we hiked up a 2000m mountain with intentions of taking the cable car down, but ended up not having enough money for a ride back down, so down we hiked (our 6 hour trip turned into an 11 hour one. . .) Looks beautiful!
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By: Steve K on July 26, 2010
at 10:48 pm